ATLANTA – Today, a group of current and former Democratic state representatives held a press conference call to call out Brian Kemp for touting crime legislation that they and Leader Abrams helped pass.

In 2010, the Georgia General Assembly passed HB 1015, “To amend Chapter 15 of Title 16 and Title 17 of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated, relating, respectively, to street gang terrorism and prevention and criminal procedure, so as to expand and change provisions relating to criminal street gangs and criminal gang activity; to provide that a person sentenced for violating the ‘Georgia Criminal Street Gang Terrorism and Prevention Act’ be supervised on probation for the duration of his or her sentence; to provide for related matters; to repeal conflicting laws; and for other purposes.”

During a press conference yesterday, and on his website, Kemp touted HB 1015, saying, “Georgia has the strongest anti-gang legislation in the nation.”

Brian Kemp “leaves out the very important fact that Stacey Abrams voted for it, Carolyn Hugley voted for it, Al Williams voted for it, along with more than 50 other Democrats,” said Democratic Party of Georgia Chair DuBose Porter. “Mr. Kemp is taking credit for other people’s work. We thank him for the appreciation of our work on the anti-gang legislation, and as far as I’m concerned, I just want to tell Brian Kemp, ‘You’re welcome. You were not in the legislature, you were not a part of it, but Stacey Abrams certainly was.'”

House Minority Whip Carolyn Hugley (D-Columbus) added, “House Bill 1015 showed that Leader Abrams and Democrats are willing to work with Republicans to make our communities safe, and we’re willing to come to the table with ideas that make sense. But our idea of community safety does not include pointing shotguns at teenagers, and our idea does not include renewing licenses of massage therapists who have pleaded guilty to assaulting women during a massage. We need more than a pretend tough guy. We need someone who’s thoughtful and who’s considerate and who’s willing to work across the aisle with people who have good ideas to keep Georgia safe and to keep our communities thriving.”

“I was surprised to see Mr. Kemp’s sudden love of legislation, after he [wasn’t] there, and it was a House bill, and certainly not being a member of the legislature he had absolutely no influence on this bill,” noted Representative Al Williams (D-Savannah). Making our communities safe, Williams said “does not include some of the things we’ve seen [Kemp] brag to Georgians that he’s in favor of. We’re not in favor of blowing things up. We’re in favor of building things.”

Concluded Williams, “No, Mr. Kemp, this was not your bill, and I, too, would like to take this opportunity to thank you for giving us credit for doing the heavy lifting.”